Magic Is Dead, page 13
Moving back to Massachusetts was more a strategic decision than one rooted in loyalty. My father refused to return to Ohio, and New England held stability and promise. My mother initially stayed home to take care of the house and us kids but eventually became my father’s secretary when he founded his tile company a few years later. He always wanted more, both materially and metaphorically, in an effort to be as far removed as possible from where he’d come from. My mother found that her life had quickly latched itself on to an immovable track. Her life—and the decisions associated with it—were driven by her emotional and logistical obligations to the ideals of stable family: her children, her husband, his business. They had a plan. The plan meant everything.
But she still made time to teach me about cards. We would sit in the living room and play out hands together, wagering with pocket change or flimsy plastic chips. We played both five-card draw and Texas hold ’em. Her teeth are narrow and sharp and, even against me, her smile would creep out from behind her thin lips as she fanned out a winning hand—a full house, say, or a king-high flush. We lived in the small, one-story rental near the center of town then, and the kitchen had cheap linoleum floors. My mother refurbished most of the furniture herself and sponge-painted the hallway that bisected the house, running from the kitchen down to the bedrooms. She was in her late thirties when I was that age, nearly twenty years since her real playing days. But now she was married and the mother of two children. She had a dream house to save for, goals to achieve. She had responsibilities. The only thing left over from that period in her life were those playing cards. They were a relic from her past, signaling a lifestyle she had since given up but not forgotten.
After my father died, she started hosting games in our basement with a group of friends. With Texas hold ’em exploding in popularity, her circle of players quickly grew. She also started taking frequent trips to casinos, playing in larger and larger tournaments and against better and better players. She won constantly. I started playing, too. I’d fold into her games or schedule a tournament with kids from my high school. While my friends and I squeezed in rounds on weekends, she was playing regularly, sometimes five or six nights a week. The schedule became normal for me: I’d get home from school and, a few hours later, she’d kiss me good-bye, leave some money for dinner, and head off to a game. She would always make sure she took care of her responsibilities at home first—a clean house, food in the fridge, emotional upkeep of her pubescent teenagers—but she always fed the need to play cards, to once again sit in those dimly lit rooms, to grasp at the fragments of a life she once had, before everything changed.
She’d come home after midnight, long after I went to bed. Normally, on my way out the door for school the next day, I’d find $100 bills laid out on the kitchen table, a trophy from a good night’s work. One night, though, I woke up around 1 A.M. to the crack and sizzle of oil in a pan, the smell of fried eggs wafting through the house. I came downstairs from my bedroom and found her hunched over the skillet. Tears ran down her face as she sucked her lower lip. I walked over and hugged her. “He’s gone and I’m just so sad,” she said. Her chest shook against mine—that spastic shuddering of pure despair. I said, “It’s okay,” after every sob, my arms wrapped around her. Behind me, a stack of money sat on the counter next to the sink.
I noticed that poker was making things easier for her. It gave her an outlet that required concentration and mental clarity. It also allowed her to make decisions solely for herself, to be a little selfish, to take risk at her own expense. And while poker may seem like an unorthodox pastime to heal the loss of a husband, to her it became a release, an opportunity for her to take control and be rewarded for being unabashedly herself—for being the risk-taking person she once was, for letting loose the part of herself that she put away when she became a wife and mother. She created a new obligation in life: herself. She was trying to find a way to be happy again, or at least forget the ways in which her life had derailed itself from the previously chosen track. She wanted to escape. And, so, I make sure we always set aside time to go to the casino together.
My mother moved tables after her cold streak at Foxwoods. A guy in his late twenties sat across from her and kept reaching over his chest to tug at his shirt just below the collarbone. He must’ve played basketball, she thought. Only basketball players adjust their shirt that way, a habit made from wearing a uniform with tank-top-like straps. I did the same thing as a kid when I played. She folded hand after hand and watched this man play. She watched the way he touched his cards, the way he grabbed his shirt. His hair was cropped short, like an athlete, but his hands were thick and calloused. What had happened to him after the dream of professional sports faded away? How did he get here, at this table, with me? What was his plan and how did it fall apart?
We cashed out our chips late, after two in the morning. She said she wanted a beer before going to bed and asked if I would sit with her. We went to the bar and I bought her the drink. We sat down, and she lit a cigarette. She told me about the guy she thought was a basketball player. It took her a while, but she finally asked him, and it turned out that he had in fact played college ball. She didn’t ask about the rest of his life. She didn’t have to. She stared off as she told me the story, tapping the end of her cigarette on the rim of the ashtray in front of her. I felt like she wanted to say something, something that she knew to be true not only about the player sitting across from her, but also herself. After nursing a long sip, she put down her beer and looked at me. She took a drag from her cigarette. “You can’t change how ingrained your past is within you,” she said. “You can’t leave that behind no matter how hard you try, even when you’re at the table. You just can’t.”
13
The Two of Clubs
Jeremy’s rumor spiraled out of control. I swear I had nothing to do with it.
During our visit to the Magic Castle, one magician after another asked me to perform. I told them I wasn’t a magician and that I didn’t know any tricks. One amateur, Lauren, was sure I was just being modest and later asked Jeremy what my deal was. “Oh, Ian? He doesn’t like to show people stuff, but he’s incredible,” he told her. “Maybe one day he’ll show you his Diagonal Palm Shift.” He was describing a sleight where the performer can seamlessly remove a card from the center of the deck and either palm it (keep it in the hand but hidden from the spectator) or move it to the bottom of the deck for easy access. It’s one of the more difficult maneuvers that magicians use. The seed he planted in Lauren’s brain continued to grow and, by the time we got to Las Vegas for Magic Live a week later, had planted roots. She was a woman on a mission. She needed to see me perform it.
“Ian, when are you going to show me your DPS?” she asked, referring to the move by its acronym. This was the third time she brought it up in the past two days.
“Okay, fine,” I told her, pulling a deck from my pocket. “Come over here. I’ll show you.” I took the top card off the deck with my right hand and showed it to her: the ten of spades. I threaded it into the middle of the deck and moved my left hand down the pack’s edge—this is where the move is supposed to happen—and then, after a moment, showed her the bottom card: the ten of spades.
“Wow,” she said. “So smooth! It’s almost like nothing is happening!”
And she was right: Nothing was happening. Jeremy and I had set up the deck that morning. I placed a duplicate ten of spades on the bottom, and the one I had taken off the top of the deck and shown her was still in the middle of the pack. I had found my own way to deceive other magicians: not through technical skill but by using my own reputation against them. An insider with the community’s most famous cast of characters, I was now viewed as someone special, and I had to keep up the act. I felt no shame in my deception; any other magician, given the opportunity, would have done the same thing.
“Do it again? Please?” she asked. I rolled my eyes.
An actor playing the part of a magician.
“Okay, fine.” I took the top card—the eight of hearts—and slid it into the middle of the deck. After squaring up the cards, I showed her the bottom: the eight of hearts.
“This is the only time I’m going to show you,” I said to her, getting up to walk away, knowing she would never suspect that I set up two duplicate cards in the deck. “Never again.”
We all hung out at the Mardi Gras bar in the Orleans Hotel and Casino—surrounded by sloppy tourists, grubby gamblers, and dejected dealers—and it became our de facto clubhouse for the duration of the trip. The true convention, however, was upstairs in the event hall: endless tables of gimmicks and props and how-to manuals, vendors shouting for your attention, hawking their latest release—just like Blackpool.
Have you seen this one?
Come close!
I’ll show you something! It kills!
But none of us had bought tickets. Ramsay and the guys treated the convention in the same way they did Blackpool: a social event, not a glorified magical flea market. We were scheduled to be there for four days. I figured that I had plenty of time to pull off my scheme.
My plan was to lure Ramsay to the nearest tattoo shop under the pretense of touching up some of my ink. Once in the shop, I would perform a trick for the tattoo artist and, after fooling the shopkeeper, turn to Ramsay and divulge that Madison had made me a member of the52. The trick would use cards, integrate the Two of Clubs, and the reveal would not really be about the tattoo artist at all, but rather about Ramsay and what we now shared. From there—buzz buzz—I would get my ink and it would be official.
My planned trick was Angle Zero (widely known as Angle Z), an effect that Madison had invented. It was actually one of his claims to fame—a trick that has been touted as one of the most influential card routines of the past decade, and solidified Madison’s place in the hierarchy of magic’s elite creators.
After its release in 2007, David Blaine started performing it on television. It made an appearance in his 2013 special Real or Magic, but he also performed it the same year during a one-on-one ABC News interview to promote his show. After the reveal, the host sat in his chair, slack-jawed and stunned, and stared at the playing card in his hand. He eventually muttered, “Wait a minute. Are you serious? How did you . . . How did you . . . Well now you freaked me out. My wallet is still with me, right?” he said, checking his back pocket. “Okay, when the cameras are off, you’ll have to show me how it’s done.” Blaine just smiled, shook the man’s hand, and extended thanks for having him on the show.
After Madison’s violent confrontation with the backroom gamblers, he was a wreck. He decided that his days playing poker, or any kind of nine-to-five life, were over. He wanted to put his skills into magic. He wasn’t someone who had grown up idolizing David Copperfield, or playing with a kiddie magic kit, but he did love cards, had a knack for sleight of hand, and had done a short stint as a card cheat. The slide over into magic, he thought, should be easy.
He started booking gigs in Bradford and was soon discovered by Dynamo, another upstart magician from the area. Dynamo was just a scrawny blue-eyed kid back then, in the early 2000s, but would eventually go on to become one of England’s most famous magicians, and star in one of the most successful magic television series in the country’s history. His brand is mysterious and otherworldly—he once walked on water over the River Thames in London—but also honest and humanistic. Dynamo has Crohn’s disease, a crippling gastrointestinal disorder, which stunted his growth as a kid. Despite being bullied, he became famous. His aspirational backstory, that you can do anything you want if you put your mind to it, made him an idol to kids and adults alike. But back in their early days, Madison and Dynamo were both just young guys trying to make a living. Madison confessed to Dynamo that he didn’t know anything about the magic industry and, despite his skill with a deck of cards, was a newbie in that world.
Shortly after they first met, Dynamo invited Madison to visit the Magic Circle in London, and Madison decided to audition for membership. He saw, back then, a community he could become a part of—a way to be accepted. “I thought, Wow, this whole industry exists, and there are places where magicians hang out and come together? And they share tricks? Yeah, I want to be a part of that!” Madison told me, mocking a past version of himself.
Madison pulled together the nicest clothes he had and walked into the parlor for his audition. A panel of judges in front of the small stage waited for him to begin. They were examining not only raw technical skill, but also style of performance and if the magician was presenting any exclusive material. Madison introduced himself, said he was visiting from the Leeds area, took out his deck, and started his set. His routine was basically material copied from David Blaine’s television specials, with a bit of his own stuff mixed in. They were effects he had never been officially taught, just things he picked up through reverse-engineering Blaine’s work or routines constructed from moves he developed on his own—which, to be honest, is highly unusual. Most magicians are taught in a traditional way, from another magician or through educational literature, but not Madison. He had come out of the beating broken and lost, and, with no connection to the magic community but still a love for it, he spent much of his time alone in a room with a deck of cards. He found comfort in solitude, and in the challenge of reverse-engineering the tricks he was seeing on his television screen. In his own little world, he had a sense of purpose, a goal to accomplish, a new skill to master—perhaps something that could carry him into the future. With his prospects as a thief thrown out the window, and his family life unstable, he needed a new path.
After Madison performed a few tricks, he waited for the judges to give their determination. “Where did you learn? Did you learn from Dai Vernon’s work?” the judging panel asked him. Madison had no idea who Vernon was, and confessed as much during their questioning. But they didn’t believe him. “You don’t have to lie to us,” they told him, chuckling. “We are all magicians here.” Madison pulled one of the judges aside.
“Listen, I almost died in a card game where I cheated, and I turned that into magic,” he said. “And I really don’t want to have to tell that story to people.”
The man smiled back at him, nearly winking in his response. “Oh, so that’s your story, huh?” he said, still grinning. Madison left feeling dejected. Despite being granted membership, he was put off by the encounter—“I saw pretty quickly how lame it all was”—and never went back to the Circle. Madison then began to write his own material and publish his take on effects and sleight-of-hand moves. In 2003, when he was twenty-three years old, he stuffed a dozen copies of his first instructional booklet, One, into his backpack and set off for the famed Blackpool Magic Convention. Madison explained to other magicians he met that he would demonstrate all the moves in his booklet the following evening at the Ruskin. Hyped up by word of mouth, nearly two dozen people showed up to watch Madison work, including a few actual names. They left in awe.
The collection of notes, a modest £10 each, sold out instantly and Madison went back to Bradford £100 richer. When he got home a few days later and checked his PayPal, which was linked to his online store, he found dozens of orders for the book. Word had spread through online forums about his performance, and everyone wanted a piece of magic’s new creative mind. “When I put that first book out, I didn’t know shit about magic,” Madison told me. “I didn’t read magic books. I had no history or point of reference at all. But people were buying it and that’s all I cared about.”
He came out with subsequent editions and sold them online as downloadable PDF booklets. Some of the moves he discovered himself, however, had already been developed and published by someone else: S. W. Erdnase. “When I first found out about Erdnase, my mind was blown,” Madison said. “People have been doing this shit for a hundred years! I was like, Fuck. I naïvely thought that I was the first person to discover these things.”
So, Madison did his homework. He started reading and researching the history of sleight of hand, both for inspiration and to properly credit his work’s roots. “The more I wrote, the more I loved it, and the more I taught, the more I loved it,” he said. He continued to put out his self-published mini-books and, in 2007, he released Dangerous, a two-DVD instructional video set detailing numerous moves—one of which was called Angle Zero. He became a household name in magic circles. “He has carved a genre and a niche and a space for himself where he doesn’t care about performance; he cares about inventing new stuff and mastering the skills and the technicalities behind it,” Dynamo told me. “Madison is a superstar amongst magicians.”
But Angle Zero was only the beginning. Madison had a mission. Two years later he began to wrap himself in his alter ego, and then five years later he created the52.
Angle Zero is a relatively simple trick—no intense sleight of hand needed—but its impact on spectators is extraordinary. That’s what makes it so special. After Madison showed me how it is done, I immediately began performing it to friends. And, after I was asked to join the52, I felt it fitting, for such a special moment, to pay homage to Madison’s influence: the trick he invented, the group he created, and the acceptance he had bestowed upon me.
Having it all go down in a tattoo shop was a shoddy plan, though. For one, the tattoos I already had didn’t need touching up (I had only three, the last the one I had gotten in Blackpool with Ramsay), and, moreover, it was deathly hot outside. August in Las Vegas, with its claustrophobic bubble of flickering lights, concrete, steel, and glass, was suffocating. No one wanted to leave the casino unless absolutely necessary.
I tried dropping subtle hints to Ramsay that we should hit up a nearby tattoo parlor. It’ll be fun. . . . Just like Blackpool . . . Got anything in mind? . . . It’s Vegas! But he wasn’t biting. He didn’t have anything he wanted to get done and, moreover, he had promised his girlfriend he would be a good boy while in Sin City: no tattoos, no gambling.
